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Strange Meeting
Strange Meeting
May 2, 2025 11:23 AM

Author:Susan Hill

Strange Meeting

Susan Hill's classic novel Strange Meeting tells of the power of love amidst atrocities.

'He was afraid to go to sleep. For three weeks, he had been afraid of going to sleep . . .'

Young officer John Hilliard returns to his battalion in France following a period of sick leave in England. Despite having trouble adjusting to all the new faces, the stiff and reserved Hilliard forms a friendship with David Barton, an open and cheerful new recruit who has still to be bloodied in battle. As the pair approach the front line, to the proximity of death and destruction, their strange friendship deepens. But each knows that soon they will be separated . . .

'A remarkable feat of imaginative and descriptive writing' The Times

'The feeling of men under appalling stress at a particular moment in history is communicated with almost uncanny power' Sunday Times

'Truly Astonishing' Daily Telegraph

Reviews

The novel that I love the most is The Quiet American

—— Ian McEwan

There has been no novel of any political scope about Vietnam since Graham Greene wrote The Quiet American

—— Harper's

A master of storytelling

—— The Times

One of the finest writers of any language

—— Washington Post

A superb storyteller - he had a talent for depicting local colour, a keen sense of the dramatic, an eye for dialogue, and skill in pacing his prose

—— New York Times

It might be nearly 60 years since The Quiet American was first published, but it still evokes the exotic promise of the Orient, and the troubled relationship Vietnam has with the West

—— Wanderlust

Tells the slowly unfolding story of Baines' journey of self-discovery with great subtlety

—— Sunday Times

Quinn has a cinematic eye for narrative scope... Like all good novels this book tells us something new

—— Spectator

An absorbing tribute to the city and its unsung heroes

—— Holly Kyte , Sunday Telegraph

In a novel of cinematic denouements, Quinn has reclaimed an intriguing chapter of Liverpool's past

—— Emma Hagestadt , Independent

A real page-tuner

—— Mail on Sunday

He [Anthony] hooks you in with his deep, complex characters; he meticulously sets the scene

—— www.thebookbag.co.uk

A constantly engaging and witty novel from a tremendously clever writer.

—— Telegraph

Plausiby drawn....strong central characters, interesting subplots and well-sketched minor characters.

—— TLS

As idiosyncratic as it is ambitious...given shape and purpose by a true literary craftsman. The book both keeps you reading and makes you think.

—— Sally Cousins , Sunday Telegraph

I drank in Nigel Farndale's The Blasphemer in huge lungfuls, and mourned it when it was finished. For anyone who loved Saturday, Atonement or Birdsong, this is the generational novel at its best.

—— Mail on Sunday
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